This shit is getting so confusing because it is clear that at least a good chunk of the US leadership doesn't want Russia to lose the war, but Russia is now decisively losing the war against Ukraine even though the political conditions are perfect for Russia to declare victory if Russia could just actually not disastorously fail on the battlefield against Ukraine.. but Ukraine now has a domestically produced 155mm self propelled armored artillery gun (~150 currently fielded, with something like 20+ a month being produced) and recently countries announced providing long term 155mm nato artillery shell supplies (not the US, but it doesn't matter, the amount of 155mm artillery shells floating around in various stockpiles in countries much more reasonable and amenable to limiting the power of authoritarian empires than the US currently is a LOT) so the idea that Russia can actually pull off anything that could be politically spun as a military victory even in Russia or the US is becoming more and more remote even as Russia basically bought the US government without even having to really buy it which again is very confusing.

The thing is, I don't actually think Putin desires to continue an offensive war in Ukraine for that much longer, or rather if he does he is a fool because he will his ass kicked by Ukraine increasingly going forward... so trying to interpret what is going on here is very confusing even as it is still brutally simple for Ukranians who just want to live a normal life and are being held in hell.

Ultimately, I think the absurdity of this situation is being sustained by the Ukranian military and resistance and whoever is helping them around the world absolutely, as I said, kick the ass of confident authoritarians in a way that makes their political theater start to badly match up with the reality being obscured underneath. Ukraine wasn't supposed to win this war, it wasn't supposed to even really resist Russia this long. Ooops!

Well, now you have the Bohdana to contend with any time you want to blitz Ukranian territory with your mechanized troops (and you thought you the Ukranian drones were the things to fear most wait til you hear from their mother...) ... soo maybe this was all a bad idea for you Russia?

Now is a good time for Putin to end the war, which is hilarious in the confusion of how it looks like now on paper is a good time for Putin to declare victory in the war (in a broader geopolitical sense, not just the invasion of Ukraine).

Czech defense giant Czechoslovak Group has nearly completed the construction of an artillery shell production line in Ukraine.

The Militarnyi’s correspondent reports this from a briefing at the Czechoslovak Group headquarters.

As part of a joint project with the Ukrainian government, the company Czechoslovak Group will soon complete the construction of a production line for manufacturing 155mm artillery shells.

The facility will ensure the production of the main range of ammunition included in the Czechoslovak Group’s manufacturing portfolio.

https://militarnyi.com/en/news/czechoslovak-group-nears-completion-of-155-mm-shell-production-line-in-ukraine/

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 day ago (3 children)

Artificial lengthening due to an amazing amount of profit being made from the war(s).

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Yes that too, I think I would describe the foreign policy strategy of the Biden administration as "keep Russia from winning too quickly and make money from it".

I don't think I would describe the Trump administration's foreign policy as that. More like, the Trump administration wants Putin to win the war, but can't figure out how to make that politically and logistically happen without dropping the ball so hard it blows off the legs of the Republican and Democratic parties' entrenched power structures.

The tensions with the Iran-Israel war, if it can be stopped before it keeps growing (a big or rather possibly long expired if) may provide the political distraction for Putin and Trump to manuever so that Russia can literally or essentially end the war without losing face, but that all hinges on the people involved in these plans being competent which we all know is a folly to believe in.

No, I think the overwhelming VAST majority of all of the money being made by U.S. connected defense industry companies happening right now is happening in profitting off of the Palestinian Genocide and selling security theater to Israel. To a stunning degree, I bet the graphs and figures that will come out of this time period by academics studying the US military industrial complex will be intimidatingly shocking in the sheer size and scale of the movements of death they quantify.

The number of bombs (almost all of them supplied if not directly by the US, indirectly by the US) dropped on Gaza since October 7th is by the numbers one of the most horrific acts of war ever done.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_bombing_of_the_Gaza_Strip

As of Dec. 22, 20,057 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the war started, according to the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry. During the Oct. 7 attack, Hamas militants killed about 1,200 people in Israel and took about 240 hostages back to Gaza, according to Israel.

The intensity of bombing in Gaza is something the researchers said they've never seen before.

"It's just the sheer speed of the damage," said Van Den Hoek. "All of these other conflicts that we're talking about [Ukraine, Syria, Yemen] are years long. This is a little over two months. And the sheer tempo of the bombing — not just the scale of it but the sheer tempo — there's nothing that tracks [like] this in such a short timeframe."

The two researchers have worked extensively on Ukraine since Russia launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022.

"The extent and the pace of damage in Gaza only compares to the heaviest-hit cities that we've seen in Ukraine," said Scher. "And those were much smaller areas. Mariupol and Bakhmut by area are smaller and the built-area density and clustering of structures was also much less."

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/israel-gaza-bombing-hamas-civilian-casualties-1.7068647

https://www.statswithsasa.com/2024/06/20/israels-historic-devastation-of-gaza/

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

And now that EU is raising their defence budgets, the US companies are giddy with excitement for all the new sales and deals they're sure to be making.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Yes, but also at the same time this represents a major shift in military industrial power away from the US, even if a dizzying amount of US defense industry companies are profiting off the process of moving the international "western" military industrial complex away from being based primarily around the axis of US power.

There are companies like Microsoft, Google and others that are hedging their bets by occupying prime spots in the Trump US authoritarian hegemony, but it is ultimately a losing proposition no matter what, all it does is buy these dying companies some more time to figure out how to bullshit their way out of the tyrant's inner circle without becoming a recognizable and culpable target of the rest of the world's moral conscience.

I am sure the CEOs and upper management of these companies can find a lot to learn about how German companies and upper management escaped culpability and indeed profited off of their loyalty to the bipartisan economic engine of war until the very end in the wake of WW2.....

The ultimate plan by the people actually in power in the US right now is to crash the US dollar and make their pet crypto projects appear to be a safe harbor temporarily so they can pump and dump it the same way the US dollar is being pumped and dumped right now.

Understand then that the traditional currents of geopolitical power are not functioning the way they would normally, we are in a new paradigm and it isn't one where the US has assumed military hegemony OR one that Russia has decisive military power.

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